No, you can't have my driver's license to "make a copy"

We're going car shopping today -- always an onerous task. Getting ready to go car shopping, we gird ourselves by reminding each other of things we've learned the hard way.

One of the sleazy things a car salesman will do is ask you to hand him your driver's license so he can "make a copy" so that he may check your credit history. In fact, this is merely a ploy to keep you on the lot once you've decided he is an asshole and you want to leave. "I want to leave now, can you give my my license back?"  "Oh geez, let's see, where did we put that??"

Never accept their order of free coffee. The ploy is to make you so desperate to go to the bathroom that you'll agree to close the deal much sooner than you have to.

As long as they're showing you things you don't want, just keep repeating the phrase "But it's not what I want." There is no defense a car salesman can make against this magic phrase. "This comes with a great style package."  "But it's not what I want."

If you ask for something, write down on a note that you've asked for it. Then you have a little checklist you can refer to. "Oh, a few minutes ago I asked for the maintenance history of this car. Weren't you going to get that for me? You do have records of that, don't you?"

In fact, that's one of my favorite tactics in almost every business situation. "Do you have a record of that?"  "Can you show me where it says that?"  "Do you have the specs on that? Do you have it in writing?"

Salesmen hate me.